and so it goes
by theeflowerchild
Summary: My mother loves me, hugs me and tells me there's nothing wrong with me, even though she reads books that teach her how to fix me. "We're all beautiful underneath our scars," I explain. "And our scars make us beautiful."


**and so it goes**  
theeflowerchild

prologue

* * *

"Welcome," he says and his voice is the same-old drastically monotone, albeit warm tenor it always has been. He smiles under a thick wool scarf, only revealing so in the way his under-eye curves upward and his one showing, brown eye sparkles. "Please, Sasuke, sit." He waves over the couch that is nestled in the center of his room in the corner of a tacky area rug.

I nod slowly, dropping my guard like I'm forced to do every time I enter this room, and sit in the uncomfortable leather that's supposed to make me feel safe. It cuts like knives against my body. "Hello."

"Not a man of many words, per usual," he comments with a small chuckle. He crosses his legs and removes his leather-bound notebook from in between his body and the arm of his leather chair. There's so much leather in this office. How many animals had to be murdered to make me feel comfortable? "Is there anything you'd like to say before we start?"

I nod my head in the negative.

He shrugs. "I figured as much... So, tell me, what's happening in the world of Sasuke?" he begins. It's the same question every time; all therapists have a tell of sorts, a question they ask to get the juices flowing. I have had many therapists come in and out of my life, but Kakashi's tell, by far, has been the cheesiest; if Kakashi were an actor, he'd be the adult that the troubled kid responds to, finally, in an after school special. He's cool, calm, warm and inviting, but a little bizarre in the most bizarre way, albeit intelligent and almost always right. He's everything a therapist should not be.

I decide not to answer.

"You know, Sasuke," he leans forward a little. I lean back. "We can do this the easy way, or the hard way."

I don't respond.

"It's always the hard way with you." He waves me off and huffs quietly, scribbling something down in a file that will never truly disappear. "How is school?" he asks.

I shrug, taking a moment to choose my words. "School is school," I whisper, my throat burning. "I'm doing well."

"It seems you're always doing well," he tells me. "You're a very smart boy, do you know that, Sasuke? Do you know how smart you really are?" he asks. Sometimes he talks to me like I don't understand.

I occupy myself with the distracting area rug. Why would he have such a tacky thing in such an otherwise classy office? Doesn't he realize the lack of a geometric repetition? There's no pattern at all.

"Sasuke?" He leans in closer again. I lean farther back. Soon enough I will hit the floor, just like every session. "Are you there?"

"Yes." I look him in the eye for a split second before they fall to my palms. I'm sweating. There's nothing they can do for the sweating, or the hives. It's from stress, he tells me, and that they need to curb my anxiety before worrying about the small things, like dripping hands or blotchy skin.

"Can you answer my question?" he requests softly.

"What was the question again?" I ask, even though I know what it is because I rarely forget anything, especially a question. I've been contemplating it since he has asked it.

He sighs. "How have you been sleeping?"

"I haven't," I answer quickly, easily.

He nods, writing carefully into his notepad. "Do you know why, Sasuke?" He doesn't even look from his pad when he asks the question. He knows he gets the best reaction when I don't need to necessarily interact.

I take the bate, for his sake. For my mother's sake. For the thousands she spends in therapy that I'll never admit that I need. "Because I think somebody is in the room."

He looks up and I regret it. _"Is_ somebody in the room?"

I shake my head. I don't bother to move the bangs from my eyes. "No. Nobody is in the room, I know that."

"Then why do you think so?" he questions, leaning closer.

I lean back and I start to feel myself falling. I hit the ground and don't bother to place myself back onto the chair. "My mind tells me so. I shut the closet, the blinds, the door and leave the lights on and sometimes it works, but sometimes I sweat and peak from under the covers to my always empty room and I know, logically, nothing is there, but..."

"But?" he leans forward and I can't look back. He isn't at all perturbed by my position on the floor.

"But... I don't know," I reveal, honestly. "I'm tired."

"I know." He shuts his book and this is the point in the session where things turn "for the better." Where he gives me his opinion and tells me everything will be okay when we both know it won't be or will be, but not now. It's not the end, but it's not the beginning. "The sleeping pills don't work?"

"I'm not sure," I say. "If I do sleep, I get nightmares, but I can't wake up. Because of the medicine. I wake up tired and sweating."

"We can't do much about the sweating," he tells me for the umpteenth time.

"I know," I bite back. He doesn't recoil. "I'm scared. My father says I'm a coward."

He leans back into his chair, intertwining his fingers and laying his hands in his lap. "Your father says a lot of things, Sasuke. What about your mother?"

"I love my mother." She is sitting outside right now, probably reading a book on how to help me. She wants to help. She always wants to help. It pains me that she can't.

"I know, but how does she feel about you?" he questions.

I sneer. "She loves me. My father and her fight."

"About...?" he asks.

"Me," I explain. "My father thinks there's something wrong with me. I am a coward. I cry too much, then I don't speak."

"I know." He nods his head in acknowledgment. "Does that bother you?"

"No." I stand, but not to sit back on the couch. I simply stand, like the zombie I've become. I never feel tired from standing, maybe because I'm already as tired as I can get. "Mother says there's nothing wrong with me."

He coughs into his fist. It's fake. _"Is _there something wrong with you?"

"There's something wrong with everyone," I explain. "For instance, you only have one eye."

He laughs. "One working one," he corrects me. "But, yes, this is true. Everybody has a flaw."

"I feel too much," I reason. "Or maybe not enough. Is it possible to experience both?"

"Anything is possible." I click my tongue at his cliché comment, but it's nearly true. He never gives me a straight answer, anyway. "How are things with your brother?"

"Quiet," I choose.

"I see... And the anxiety?" he asks.

"Loud." I rub a hand through my hair, pushing my bangs out of my swollen, bloodshot eyes. They hurt when I blink, occasionally. My throat continues to burn as I sleep. "The pills don't work."

"I've been speaking to your mother about upping the dosage," he reports to me. "How would you feel about that? Leave the Lexapro as is, up the anxiety meds by one more pill a day and we'll take up the sleeping pills to two dosages instead of one? How does that sound?"

"Does it matter how I feel? You're the doctor," I say.

He sighs. "It _always_ matters how you feel, Sasuke. Remember that."

"Okay," I quake.

"Sasuke, may I ask you a question?" He sat back up, leaning forward once again. Despite myself, I took a step back.

"Even if I said no, you'd ask it anyway," I explain.

He nods his head in agreement and chuckles softly. "I do respect your feelings, Sasuke, whether you'd like to admit it or not." I do not respond, he sighs. "How do you feel? Right at this very moment?"

"If I knew the answer to that question, I wouldn't be here," I remark, more to myself.

He laughs. He's always laughing. "I guess that's a good answer. Good enough for me, at least. How have your eating habits been?"

"I eat," I tell him. "And then I don't eat."

"Have you gained any weight recently?" he inquires.

"I haven't lost any," I say.

He sighs. "I guess that's better than anything... Your skin seems clearer," he comments. "You haven't been picking at it."

"Perhaps the anxiety medicine _is_ working." I've never had acne. I have perfect porcelain skin like my mother that my mind decides to ruin while I'm asleep via my own fingers. "Is it working?"

"I don't know, is it?" I ask.

"It seems so," he reassures me. "You're a very handsome boy underneath the wounds, Sasuke."

"We're all beautiful underneath our scars," I explain. "And our scars make us beautiful."

"Deep," he deadpans. "Have you been reading?"

"I never stop," I claim. It's true.

"Occupying yourself is good, Sasuke," he says with a smile. His eyes fall to my palms. "How are your arms?"

I inspect them. The flesh from my wrist to my mid-forearm is freshly torn. "They've seen better days."

He clucks his tongue. "Such a ray of sunshine you are. Self-harm is no joke, Sasuke."

"I never said it was," I whisper. "I guess the Lexapro isn't working."

"At least something is..." He sighs loudly. "You are a very complex person, Sasuke," he says. These are almost always his final words: "We'll fix you. I promise."

I didn't realize I was broken.

* * *

My throat burns, but I'm not sick. I have a fear of speech; there is a scientific term for it, but I do not know what it's called. Or maybe I do remember, but giving it a clinical label makes it real. I have so many thoughts collaborating, contemplating, racing, jumping, screaming and fighting all in my mind at once all fighting for my lips and vocal chords.

My lips don't move fast enough, I stutter and stumble and stop. I don't try anymore. It takes me very long to gather my thoughts into one finite answer, longer than most people. I can't answer a question in a limited amount of time. Most people believe I have a learning disability of sorts, but my doctors know better. _I _know better. I think too much and don't feel enough. I have no filter, so I don't speak.

I can't sleep. These thoughts plague me in a way that is unexplainable; a way that creates figures and monsters that don't exist and watch me while I sleep. My bed has no under, I've removed the legs, so that fear is gone. My chair cannot be facing me when I sleep for the fear that I will wake, look and somebody will be sitting in it. I lock my closet. The lights must be on, a pillow must be over my face and a blanket over that, covering my entire body and twisting into my curves and cleavages as tightly as possible, but loose enough so that I can remove the blanket for a quick escape. The curtains must be drawn, the blinds tight and, on bad days, my mirror covered by a sheet. I take my pills and sometimes, I sleep, but other times I am simply jailed into a nightmare that never ends. Somebody once said to me, "sleep is like death, without the commitment," but I can't even experience that simple pleasure because I can't sleep.

I cry a lot. My father tells me I'm a coward. I cry some more. It's an endless cycle of _you're never good enough_.

My mother loves me, hugs me and tells me there's nothing wrong with me, even though she reads book that teach her how to fix me. I allow myself to believe her for the sake of her own sanity.

My brother is talkative and bright and friendly and perfectly lovely; he's brilliant and popular, talented and driven. There's nothing wrong with him. Sometimes, he talks to me, about books and about girls and about video games and sometimes, he does not. Sometimes he says he has no brother, sometimes he gives me looks of disappointment and sometimes, he ignores me when I cry. Sometimes he is pensive and mean, sometimes he agrees with my father, but secretly, he agrees with my mother. He wants to fix me.

I walk into the kitchen, like every morning, my uniform draping over my body, swallowing me whole and strangling me. The oven is on, I can smell sausage links and bacon, and my mother is sitting at the table, reading one of her stupid books again on how to repair what isn't quite broken. My mother clucks her tongue when she sees me. "Sweetheart, do you ever brush your hair?"

I sit in my normal seat and shrug. She clucks her tongue at my lack of a verbal response.

My mother is very motherly. She tsk's and shakes her head, she puts her hands on her hips and puffs out her cheeks when she's angry, she laughs and smiles gingerly when she's happy, she cooks and she cleans and she brushes her hair a lot. She teaches preschool down the road and she always wears floral dresses and colorful capris. "Did you want to eat this morning, dear?"

"Maybe," I answer. She smiles softly in return. "Do we have any milk?"

She bursts up from her seat, throwing her book down. "Of course we do!" She gets excited when I inquire for nourishment, so I humor her. She pours me a tall glass, filled to the brim. I won't finish it. "There we go! All for you, sweetheart!"

"Thank you, mom." I take a long sip, let her see me swallow it and place the glass back down.

She sits back down across from me, staring me down and smiling, waiting for the food to cook, waiting for me to drink some more, perhaps waiting for a switch to flick and for me to turn back into the bright, sunny kid I once was. I think she dreams of that, sometimes, that one day she wakes up and I'm eating junk food, playing video games, talking about pretty girls with my brother and walking with her to the grocery store to buy fresh fruit and mac and cheese. I wonder if that will ever happen, too, sometimes. Sometimes I pray for it.

"Good morning mom, Sasuke," my brother says, yawning. His uniform fits well, handsomely. Mine used to. "Is that bacon?"

"Yes it is! And it's almost done!" she exclaims. "Did you hear your father at all, Itachi?"

He nods his head in the negative, sitting down next to me and cuffing my shoulder. I blink at him and he smiles, like he usually does. "I did not. He's probably not awake yet; I didn't hear him come in until very late last night, am I right?"

"You're right." She sighs. She always sighs, like the therapist. "He's been really over-working himself these days."

"I'm sorry," I tell her. I'm not sure if it's because I'm genuinely sorry or because I know he avoids coming home because I'm here and I just cause more fights.

She sighs and laughs at the same time. "Sweetheart, don't be sorry. Your father just puts a lot of passion into his work, I don't mind!" That's a lie.

She removes the sizzling tray from the oven and places the meat onto a dish. My mother is somewhat of a health-freak; she bakes everything, from french fries to chicken to bacon, of course. She'll find any way to make something that's already crap a little healthier. "Sasuke, will you be having any?"

"No thank you, mom, I'm actually fill." Itachi shoots me a look I choose to ignore. I'm not even sure if he knows I register his annoyance, but I don't care, either. "Thank you for the milk. I'm going to leave now."

Before I can even begin walking toward the door, Itachi asks me, "Do you want to walk together, Sasuke?"

"I need some alone time," I tell him, which is true, but I'm also always alone. I always have alone time. "I'll see you at school."

He purses his lips and sighs. "Alright." He doesn't pursue me and eats his generous portion of bacon, some of which I was supposed to eat.

I'm not sure if I even like walking alone every day, but I don't like conversation and I don't like being a burden. I pull my messenger bag over my shoulder and ready myself for a new day.

* * *

**I don't really write angst, so please tell me how you're feeling about this piece. I kind of like it, actually. I like Sasuke's dynamic, I guess; putting rhyme to reason.**

**Please review! They're always appreciate, including constructive criticism. **

**Peace.**


End file.
